


Unsalvageable

by KairosImprimatur



Category: Daredevil (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-28
Updated: 2016-03-28
Packaged: 2018-05-29 14:48:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 402
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6380572
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KairosImprimatur/pseuds/KairosImprimatur
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Karen emerges from the aftermath knowing herself better, but finds she didn't know Matt at all.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Unsalvageable

**Author's Note:**

> Just fictionalizing some thoughts I had about the season finale. Karen's one of my favorite characters and I hope she finds happiness, with or without Matt.

Frank made that connection between pain and love, urging her to see her feelings for Matt in a different light, but instead it makes her think of Frank himself. Just hearing his name (or his sensationalist new title) gives her a physical sense of terror, followed by a shockwave of hurt and the fading gleam of desperate hope. 

She doesn’t desire Frank -- she never has -- but the emotional tidal wave doesn’t leave her thinking, _I don’t love you,_ so maybe he has a point.

But the same thing happens whenever she thinks of Matt (which is far, far too often). No terror for him and certainly no hope, just the hurt, plus a constant, simmering fury. She wonders if Frank would have told her that this means there’s still something there to salvage. 

It doesn’t matter. She knows she’s right. Matt’s trail of damage goes beyond emotion. It even goes beyond their relationship. She’s better off without him.

What’s worse, in a way, is Foggy. It’s the last thing she expected, because she’s happy for him, _so_ happy. Their friendship is among the best things in her life right now. She doesn’t need pain to know she loves Foggy.

There’s pain anyway. Jealousy, because he’s found his place. Regret, because she’ll never know if she should have made her move back when he was in love with her. He doesn’t seem as pissed off at Matt as she would be in his place, and she doesn’t understand why.

Hell’s Kitchen has broken her heart, so she falls in love with it. She stops flinching at images of the human skull. She takes pride in her work for the New York Bulletin. She rebuilds her life, bit by bit, rummaging through the pain to find the seeds of love in it and throw the rest away.

By the time she sees Matt again, she believes in herself. Even her righteous anger has dulled; no apology from him will make a difference, and nothing he has in that paper bag can bring her joy. If she’s curious about what he’ll say, it’s curiosity for its own sake -- she is a journalist now, after all.

He says he’s Daredevil. It’s not fair, she thinks, to turn him into a new person when she’s finally come to peace with how she feels about the old one.

Matt takes pain out of the bag. Karen sees love.


End file.
